Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a controller for a machine tool, which is provided with an additional-axis composed of a tilting table and a rotary table, one of which is assumed to be a first axis of additional shaft and the other of which is assumed to be a second axis of additional shaft.
Description of the Related Art
In mounting an additional-axis on a machine tool such as a machining center, the manufacturer of the machine tool, a setup maker of jigs and the like, or an end user may alternatively mount an additional shaft on the machine tool and set parameters.
In the case where the machine tool manufacturer or setup maker performs the additional shaft mounting on the machine tool and the parameter setting, the user is not expected to perform these operations to move the additional shaft.
In the case where the user mounts the additional shaft on the machine tool, in contrast, the additional shaft to be mounted should be one that is manufactured by a manufacturer different from the machine tool manufacturer, since many machine tool manufacturers neither manufacture additional shafts in-house nor mount them.
Therefore, the user must purchase the machine body and the additional shaft from different manufacturers, accurately mount the additional shaft unaided on the machine tool, and set parameters. Since mounting and leveling the additional shaft on the machine tool require accuracy, the user's operation is inevitably time-consuming.
Normally, however, users do not want to take much time to set the parameters to control the additional shaft for movement. Accordingly, many machine tool manufacturers select the model numbers of the additional shaft, a motor used for the additional shaft, etc., so that the machine tool can be provided with the function of setting some of the parameters, thereby reducing the parameter setting time.
As a prior art example of the function of collectively setting parameters, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-108425 discloses a parameter collective setting method to be performed as the table loading capacity of a machine tool is set. This patent document describes how to collectively set control parameters by selecting a weight corresponding to the gross weight of jigs and the like in a table from among a plurality of set weights.
According to the technique disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-108425, the parameters can be collectively set by estimating the gross weight and selecting a weight similar to it. Mechanical operations can be performed even if a wrong weight is selected. According to the prior art technique, moreover, some of the parameters can be collectively set by selecting the respective model numbers of a motor and an additional shaft.
Since the orientation of the additional shaft to be mounted on the machine tool, the rotation direction of the shaft, etc., are differently set depending on the mounting state of the table, however, there is no function to collectively set parameters for such setting. Therefore, an operator must set these parameters one by one, resulting in time-consuming parameter setting. Further, some of the parameters are so difficult to set that the operator may set them wrongly.